The Top 25 Video Game Villains of Every Subtype Imaginable

[Captain B. Zarre]

CC, where are you?

 

[CC13]

Majora's Mask from.... Majora's Mask.

CC, where are you?

My apologies for the delay—I've had a lot of things keeping me busy lately. Also, TY for the thread bump.

Anyway, Majora's Mask was indeed the answer I was looking for! What secrets does this sinister disguise keep? Read below for the answers:

19. Majora's Mask (The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask)
Developed & Published By: Nintendo
Platform: N64
Year of Release: 2000

Though almost any large video game publisher will find themselves criticized for repetition in their longer-running franchises, Nintendo seem particularly apt for attracting such criticisms. The most extreme such partisans even claim that Nintendo never come out with any new IPs (this is patently false, though Nintendo could stand to advertise their new IPs a bit more vigorously), but critiques of Mario's overexposure and underutilization of some fan-favorite IPs (we only just managed to get EarthBound on the Wii U Virtual Console a couple of months ago and I'm still waiting on another F-Zero!) are far more trenchant. Still, though true fans should always push for Nintendo to do better, they are, realistically speaking, far ahead of most other large publishers in terms of innovation. For starters, very few would approve of something that subverted a long-running franchise's formulas as Majora's Mask subverted the tropes of The Legend of Zelda.

The basic setup is that after the events of The Ocarina of Time (Majora's Mask takes place in the Child Timeline, the continuity that stems from Link being sent back into his childhood and preventing Ganondorf from obtaining the Triforce to begin with, for those of you playing along at home), Link is knocked off Epona when two fairies named Tatl and Tael startle her. The Skull Kid, who is wearing a mystering mask, steals Epona from Link; Link goes searching for her, but the Skull Kid has other ideas, which largely involve transforming him into a Deku Scrub. The transformed Link, accompanied by Tatl, goes into an underground passage, where he encounters the Happy Mask Salesman, who offers to help Link regain his form in exchamge for his lost ocarina; however, he will leave in 3 days, so Link only has that long to find the ocarina. Link then finds himself in the city of Clock Town in the parallel dimension known as Termina and must not only return to human form, but also save Termina from Majora's depredations.

Though initially something of a contested sequel to the untouchable Ocarina of Time (partly because OoT is an incontestable classic and partly due to the Zelda Cycle), Majora's Mask has come to be appreciated for its unique take on what a Zelda title can be. From a mechanical perspective, Majora's Mask's primary feature is its Groundhog Day loop mechanic. Three days may not seem like much time to regain your human form and deal with a city-crushing moon, but if you play the Song of Time, you can return to the dawn of the first day you spent in Termina, thus giving you plenty of time to deal with Majora. This is a crucial part of gameplay, as certain events are only accessible during specific points in the three days you have before the moon falls on Clock Town, so expect to use the Song of Time quite frequently.

However, though the Groundhog Day loop is a clever mechanic to build a game around, it is only part of the appeal of Majora's Mask. To my mind, what really has made the game endure through the years as a classic is its front-and-center placement of themes of loss and moving on that are present in many other Zelda games, but muted or perhaps even absent from Ocarina of Time, which came directly before Majora's Mask in release order. Themes of loss and moving on have been present in the series at least since Link's Awakening, with the dream world of Kokiri Island, which Link must unmake to return to his own world and can only save, at most, one resident of—Malon—with her form in Hyrule being that of a seagull even should you succeed, but Ocarina of Time confuses this motif somewhat. Normally, one game would scarcely have such an effect, but even 15 years later, Ocarina of Time stands as the best-selling game in the series and probably also the most highly regarded. Thus, the way the game ends, with Link getting to return to his childhood and have a chance to relive the 7 years of life he lost in the game, could muddle the view many fans have of the themes of the Zelda series.

In comparison, those same themes are clearly at the heart of Majora's Mask. The game starts off with you losing Epona, who had been almost a constant presence alongside you in Ocarina of Time's overworld, making it obvious from the get-go that loss and moving on will feature prominently in the story at whose beginning you now stand. More tellingly, though, the Groundhog Day loop figures prominently into these themes. This is something of a moment of realization when it hits you, but I think that the symbolism of moving past an unending replay of the same 3 days over and over speaks for itself in this context if you think about it. The villain of the piece also has a failure to accept a major personal loss as his root motivation, but giving any more details than that would be a massive spoiler, so I'll say no more about that here.

Majora's Mask stands as the most direct statement of what drives the Zelda series and makes it a compelling draw after 27 years and 17 main entries as of November 22 of this year. Though Ocarina of Time may have won the battle for how Legend of Zelda games play in the 21st century, Majora's Mask won the battle for those games' thematic souls, with melancholy far exceeding unrestrained joy in frequency in the tales these games tell. From the flooding of Hyrule in The Wind Waker to the banishment of the Twili and their survival in the Dark Realm in Twilight Princess to the abandoning of Skyworld and the initial binding of Link's descendants to face Ganondorf through the ages in Skyward Sword, few big-budget video game franchises better exemplify themes of moving forward from the past & how this is a panful-yet-necessary process than The Legend of Zelda.

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: Do me so far, do me...

 

[Captain B. Zarre]

Peter the Parrot from StarTropics?

 

[CC13]

Peter the Parrot from StarTropics?

It's StarTropics, all right, but Peter the Parrot isn't quite who I had in mind. I'm sure you know who I have in mind, though—he captured the last children of an alien race in a crystal and his name appears in the title of the sequel...

 

[netizen]

it's startropics, all right, but peter the parrot isn't quite who i had in mind. I'm sure you know who i have in mind, though—he captured the last children of an alien race in a crystal and his name appears in the title of the sequel...

zoda!!

 

[CC13]

zoda!!

Zoda is indeed the answer I was looking for! Could StarTropics finally get a long-awaited third entry? I wouldn't count on it, but the two we did get are great! Keep reading to find out why:

18. Zoda (StarTropics)
Developed & Published By: Nintendo
Platform: NES
Year of Release: 1990

The IP holdings of large video game publishers tend to have an odd remit. Even more so than most large media enterprises, video game publishers' holdings tend to center around a few large franchises, with various odds & ends playing supporting roles in their portfolios. Nintendo tend to do better than most at playing up their lower-tier franchises, but even they have a seemingly endless supply of properties left by the wayside. The archetypal such property is usually one that the Western fans care more about than their Japanese counterparts, so given that StarTropics was explicitly designed to appeal to Americans and was never released in Japan, it's not terribly surprising in retrospect that Nintendo left the series behind after just two entries.

Before we go any further, I must bring attention to one of the best feelies ever packed with any video game. At a certain point in the game, you will be asked to soak a letter from Dr. Jones in water in order to find a number you need for a puzzle. You have no such item in your inventory, but getting the copy of the letter found in your actual game manual wet will reveal the number (I have heard at least one nightmare story concerning this—DeceasedCrab, one of the better-known Let's Players out there, did a Let's Play of StarTropics, where he intimated that he had reached the aforementioned point in the game, gotten confused, and had previously disposed of his letter...because he had gotten it wet). In case you're wondering, the dipping process is simulated in the Virtual Console release of the game, so there shouldn't be any issues there.

The gameplay is nothing that anybody who's played Zelda II hasn't seen before, but why is StarTropics so much more readily accepted than its inspiration, which is considered a series black sheep in some circles to this day? There are several reasons for this, the most pedestrian of which is that Zelda II actually did significantly muddle with its predecessor's formula. This is actually a fairly common phenomenon with video game franchises on the NES, with Castlevania, Final Fantasy and even Super Mario having notably divergent second installments (though Super Mario Bros. 2 is actually a mere dolled-up installment, rather than a true sequel to Super Mario Bros., this can also be applied to The Lost Levels, with its backwards warps, poison mushrooms and near-impossible requirements to reach the true end of the game). StarTropics, on the other hand, had no prequels to measure against it, giving it much more freedom to stand or fall on its own merits.

In addition, the game knows how its mechanics work and designs every single dungeon around those mechanics. Movement in StarTropics is very limited, with only direct horizontal & vertical movement being possible and requiring extended D-Pad presses to actually move (if you only tap the D-Pad, Mike will turn in the direction you tapped, but will not move). However, you automatically jump from platform to platform in the direction you move in, greatly reducing the frustrations of your limited movement. This sort of design philosophy–turning a weakness of technical limitations into a distinctive strength–permeates much of the 8-bit era's greatest hits and shines through here.

However, StarTropics' greatest asset is its great sense of humor. This is the sort of game where having bananas in your ears makes sense in context and you are expected to find the fact that every city and country in the game world has a name ending in -cola hilarious. Goofy puns abound in both games (for starters, Chief Miracola's daughter has the unfortunate name of Bananette), pop culture references are par for the course (including a well-hidden allusion to Nintendo Power mascot Nester) and the game does not take itself even a little bit seriously. In addition to lending the game a unique charm, StarTropics' sense of humor helps mask some design decisions that may not have aged so well, including the old trope of having to talk to everybody in order to advance to the next part of the game and the fact that you lose all your items & only start with 3 hearts if you die during one of the levels.

For his part, Zoda fits right in by not fitting in at all. This may seem strange at first blush, but Zoda is every bit as over-the-top as everything else in the game, just in a different way. You only really start confronting his evil plan in the seventh of eight chapters in the game, while he only introduces himself in the final chapter, where he rants at you telepathically about how he will destroy you just as he destroyed the Argonians (for those interested, this is the event that causes Mike to stick bananas in his ears–doing this can apparently block alien telepathy). Also, both his character designs are as stereotypically villainous as they come–in his humanoid form, he looks like an armored medieval warlord with red eyes and an imposing horned helmet, but his true form is actually a Giger-esque alien; Zoda's first form is the first boss of Chapter 8, while his true form serves as the final boss, complete with a vomit indiscretion shot after you defeat him. Even more bizarrely, in the in sequel, StarTropics II: Zoda's Revenge, you must defeat three separate Zodas across Earth's history: Zoda-X, Zoda-Y & Zoda-Z.

StarTropics was actually pretty popular in its day, serving as something of a last hurrah for the venerable NES before Nintendo brought the Super NES stateside, as it was the last original title Nintendo published on the NES in North America before the Super NES arrived in August of 1991 (StarTropics II actually filled a similar role, being the penultimate officially released NES game, with only Wario's Woods coming out subsequently). However, as previously mentioned, neither game has seen a Japanese release in any form, even on the Virtual Console, continuing a vicious cycle where the games are unknown in Japan, so Nintendo essentially pretend they don't exist, so they never release any new StarTropics titles and so on and so forth. Any change to this would most likely require a massive outcry from the North American fanbase, but never doubt the power of Super Smash Brothers–I seem to recall another yoyo-wielder-fronted series that began to get more mainstream exposure after being featured in that franchise. Either way, though, StarTropics deserves your attention, especially once it gets re-rereleased on the Wii U Virtual Console (you WILL put these games on there, right, Nintendo?).

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: Don't break my heart, my achy, breaky heart...

 

[CC13]

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: Don't break my heart, my achy, breaky heart...

You'd think I'd learn to stop using song-based clues, but I apparently have a very steep learning curve. Anyway, bear in mind who sang Achy Breaky Heart; the answer should be obvious at the end of it all.

 

[netizen]

Cyrus of Team Galactic?

 

[CC13]

Cyrus of Team Galactic?

That's the one! Pokemon took a while to arrive on the list, but it certainly arrived in style! What makes Cyrus a worthy successor to the classic villains who came before him? Read on to find out:

17. Cyrus (Pokemon Diamond/Pearl/Platinum)
Developed By: Game Freak
Published By: Nintendo, The Pokemon Company
Platform: DS
Year of Release: 2006

Even though it gets plenty of recognition, Pokemon still feels underrated in certain respects. Though it usually gets the credit it deserves for keeping Nintendo afloat through the dark days of the middle-to-late-'90s, it rarely gets brought up in discussions of RPG franchises. My guess would be that the inherently interchangeable nature of your party has something to do with this, but one other shadow looms large: Team Rocket. Hardcore fans are well aware of the group's competence, but more casual followers have Jessie, James & Meowth as their reference points, with their ludicrous schemes to capture Ash's Pikachu and dismal string of failures. However, even at their most efficient & competent, Team Rocket's thievery pales in comparison to the other villainous teams that followed them, including today's subjects: Team Galactic, along with their leader, Cyrus.

For starters, Team Galactic, as their name might imply, operate on a completely different scale than Team Rocket. While Team Rocket seek to steal Pokemon for profit and perhaps dominate the world, Team Galactic seek nothing less than to rewrite reality itself. To do this, they seek to capture one of three legendary Pokemon, either Dialga (in Diamond), Palkia (in Pearl) or both (in Platinum). One question still remains, though: what role does Cyrus play in all of this? The answer is quite simple: he seeks to seize the power of those Pokemon (Dialga & Palkia are essentially the gods of space & time I'm the Pokemon universe), which would effectively make him the god of Team Galactic's new world, unbeknownst to the rest of Team Galactic.

However, Cyrus knows that nobody will follow him once they figure out that he wants to keep all the power for himself, so he takes a surprisingly genre-savvy countermeasure: hiring the most incompetent minions possible. Though this may seem an odd choice at first, it actually makes a lot of sense, as it heads off not only the aforementioned possibility of the minions wising up to Cyrus' plan, but also the possibility of a coup. In addition, it also helps explain Team Galactic's rather silly-looking uniforms–anyone smart enough to recognize how silly the uniforms are would be a threat to figure out what Cyrus was really up to, so they filter out potential threats from Cyrus' organization. In spite of his highly counterintuitive hiring practices, however, Cyrus' ambitions to capture Dialga and/or Palkia almost come to fruition, with only his having overlooked the existence of Giratina, a legendary Pokemon that most likely represents antimatter, derailing his master plan. Even then, he receives no proper comeuppance, with even his staying in the Distortion World in Pokemon Platinum being voluntary on his part, as he wishes to study it and learn its secrets.

In terms of storytelling in the games, Cyrus & Team Galactic expand on the broader narrative foundations first laid down in Pokemon Ruby & Sapphire. Cyrus' goal of remaking the world without spirit is all but openly stated to be a response to severe childhood abuse and/or neglect, with a man strongly implied to be his grandfather expressing regret at not stepping in to help him sooner. Meanwhile, Cyrus' admins also gain expanded characterizations, with Platinum-exclusive admin Charon being a self-centered, uncharismatic scientist, while Jupiter seemed to only follow Cyrus for kicks and both Mars & Saturn truly believing in Team Galactic's goals (with the latter even turning the group into a legitimate energy research firm after Cyrus' defeat and Charon's arrest). Bizarrely, despite his claims that emotions are useless, one of Cyrus' Pokemon is a Crobat, a Pokemon you can only get if you have a Golbat that really loves its owner; however, this is usually taken as evidence of how skilled Cyrus is at manipulating the emotions of others.

Cyrus and Team Galactic stand as testimony to the growth of the Pokemon franchise from its relatively humble beginnings. Just as the relatively simple monster-battling RPG of Generation I grew to incorporate breeding, equipable items, superpowered Mega Evolutions (imitate Digimon much?) and over 700 Pokemon, so too did the series' narrative grow past Team Rocket and its rather straightforward goals to the literally world-changing ambitions of Teams Aqua & Magma, the PETA/ALF-inspired shenanigans of Team Plasma, the apocalyptic designs of Team Flare and, of course, the universe-shaping plans of Team Galactic. This, of course, does not include what happened in the anime, manga and spinoff games, which could each easily support 3 or 4 entries like this one. With Pokemon showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon, we can only guess at what the future holds for Nintendo's premier handheld franchise.

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: 3, 2, 1, GO!

 

[netizen]

Falcon from F-Zero

 

[CC13]

Falcon from F-Zero

Wait, what? Captain Falcon's the hero of his series! He is probably better known for his appearances in another series these days, though–coincidentally, this is the same series from which the villain I have in mind hails...

 

[Sean DonCarlos]

Master Hand, from Super Smash Bros.

 

[netizen]

Wait, what? Captain Falcon's the hero of his series! He is probably better known for his appearances in another series these days, though–coincidentally, this is the same series from which the villain I have in mind hails...

I never really saw anyone as "The Hero" in the F-Zero series. Falcon was a Bounty Hunter, it's not like he was a Disney Grade good guy. I think he just got retconned for Super Smash Bros to appear "better" than samurai Goroh in retrospect.

According to the Nintntedo wiki, both Goroh and Falcon used to be cops together, and Goroh has disliked Falcon since their days together on the force.
Falcon is not the mascot of the series, just the best known.

But I guess, perhaps, you are looking for Samurai Goroh as he, apart from Falcon, is the other character that is in the most of the series.

 

[CC13]

Master Hand, from Super Smash Bros.

And Sean DonCarlos does it again! How did a massive gloved hand make it to the #16 spot on this list? It's partly a question of legacy, as we'll talk about below:

16. Master Hand (Super Smash Bros.)
Developed By: HAL Laboratory
Published By: Nintendo
Platform: N64
Year of Release: 1999

In hindsight, a massive company-wide crossover like Super Smash Bros. seems supremely obvious for a company with Nintendo's storied video gaming legacy, but its beginnings were quite humble. In fact, the game initially was not planned to have Nintendo's famous roster at all, but a suggestion from former HAL Laboratory president and current Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata to game director Masahiro Sakurai to add Nintendo characters to what was then know as Dragon King: The Fighting Game set the stage for the mascot fighter series we all know and love, though Sakurai did have to work on the game in secret for much of its early development, as the idea of a Nintendo-themed fighting game may not have gone well with HAL Laboratory's partner. Thankfully for gamers across the globe, the prototype was approved, the game sold well in Japan, Nintendo decided to localize it in the West and the rest, as they say, is history.

The bare-bones, budget-game origins of the original Super Smash Bros. can still be seen in much of the game's design. The most commonly-seen example is the Wireframe Fighters, whom you fight en masse in the penultimate stage of the single-player campaign (and also race against in the third bonus stage). There is also not terribly much hidden content in the game, with only 4 hidden fighters (Captain Falcon, Jigglypuff, Luigi & Ness) and 1 hidden stage (Mushroom Kingdom) up for grabs, as well as 3 bonus stages (Break the Targets, Board the Platforms & Race to the Finish) for each character. Master Hand's simple design, consisting solely of an enormous gloved hand, also seems redolent of this simplistic design style, and on some level, I have to admit that it is, but there is also a historical precedent for Sakurai having a giant hand as the final boss.

In Kirby Super Star, one of the modes you can unlock is The Great Cave Offensive, a massive treasure hunt with 60 items to find across 4 worlds. In addition to its refreshing take on the Kirby premise (not to mention premiering Simirror, which is probably my favorite Kirby power in any of the games I've played), its four main boss battles stand as some of the best in the Kirby franchise. First, in the Sub-Tree Area, you face off against Fatty Whale, a pipe-smoking whale who dresses like a sailor and whose sheer bulk sends rocks flying down from the top of the screen; next up, at the end of the Crystal Area, is Computer Virus, a sequential boss who pastiches JRPG battle tropes, while Chameleo Arm, a fast-moving chameleon with a prehensile tongue, awaits Kirby at the Old Tower. However, Wham Bam Rock (most likely literally) stands above them all. At the end of the Garden Area, this massive rock titan will assault you with his massive fists, grabbing, slapping, punching, pounding and dropping rocks on you; his attacks should mostly seem familiar to anyone who ever faced off with Master Hand. Kirby Super Star Ultra ups the ante, placing a souped-up version of Wham Bam Rock called Wham Bam Jewel at the end of Helper to Hero, a new mode for Super Star Ultra that places you in the shoes of one of Kirby's many helpers (hint: Bonkers=Easy Mode); in addition to Wham Bam Rock's attacks, Wham Bam Jewel can also drop bombs along with rocks (though the rocks are now jewels, they can still give you the Stone ability if you swallow them, though you'll only get the opportunity in The True Arena), as well as fire energy blasts from his fingers; this was almost certainly cribbed directly from Master Hand's arsenal (though Master Hand fires bullets/missiles instead of energy blasts), as Wham Bam Jewel, unlike Wham Bam Rock, premiered after Super Smash Bros.

It would be interesting enough to see that Master Hand's inspiration came from the Kirby series, but he actually has made a canonical Kirby boss appearance in Kirby and the Amazing Mirror. First, he shows up as a miniboss throughout the game and can be inhaled after you defeat him (hint: you can both reach and defeat him very easily in Rainbow Route with Spark) to give you the Smash ability. This copy ability essentially gives Kirby his Super Smash Bros. Melee moveset, including Stone, Final Cutter and Hammer, along with several others. Later, you can find him at the end of Candy Constellation, where he guards one of the pieces of the titular mirror alongside Crazy Hand. They have all the team-up moves you would expect from them, though their damage output is somewhat toned down from Melee. This raises some questions about the way SSB fans typically view Master Hand...

The intro to the original Super Smash Bros. makes it very clear that the fights you play out are all happening at Master Hand's behest. What remains vague, however, is precisely the nature of the Master Hand as relates to the characters he has fighting for his amusement. One common interpretation is the most obvious one based on what we see–namely, that the fighters are simply toys, with Master Hand standing in for the person playing with them. However, if we take this in combination with what we just read in the last paragraph, this leads to some strange and disturbing results (I sincerely doubt that a reasonably well-adjusted child could come up with the likes of Dark Matter...). Even if we leave that aside (as I intend to do), what does that make Tabuu? This is important, as Master Hand was actually controlled by Tabuu during the events of The Subspace Emissary.

If we go forward with the assumption that Master Hand is indeed a person playing with toys, then it follows that Tabuu must represent someone or something that wants to prevent him from doing so. Indeed, taking a look at TV Tropes' Wild Mass Guesses for Super Smash Bros. reveals that some variation of this idea is the basis for many of the WMGs that relate to Master Hand and Tabuu. The more literal interpretations seem to like interpreting Tabuu as Master Hand's father, who is forcing him to clean up his toys, but a more figurative interpretation makes Tabuu into a manifestation of social disapproval of Master Hand's hobby, which would make The Subspace Emissary a parable about the value of hobbies that not everyone might appreciate. After having been pressured into putting away his trophies, Master Hand, now a grown man, stumbles across the trophies for King Dedede, Ness and Luigi, finding an online community of likeminded hobbyists around his own age, with one particular hobbyist whose favorite trophy is Sonic being the one who convinces Master Hand to bring his trophies back out, even buying Toon Link & Wolf to add to the collection.

In a sense, it is very appropriate that Master Hand should take the form of a hand wearing a glove, for his simple form belies a surprisingly complicated bundle of questions. In addition to the high probability that he was meant as some sort of placeholder at some point, we also can find a descendant of his creator's design lineage, a crossover character who raises quite a few questions, an ambiguous MC and perhaps even an audience surrogate of sorts, reassuring the players that their continued love for supposedly "kiddie" video games well into adulthood is perfectly fine, maybe even a good thing. That's quite a lot for one disembodied hand to encompass, but we'll find ourselves back in the Smash universe again before too long...

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: Exit light, enter night...

I never really saw anyone as "The Hero" in the F-Zero series. Falcon was a Bounty Hunter, it's not like he was a Disney Grade good guy. I think he just got retconned for Super Smash Bros to appear "better" than samurai Goroh in retrospect.

According to the Nintntedo wiki, both Goroh and Falcon used to be cops together, and Goroh has disliked Falcon since their days together on the force.
Falcon is not the mascot of the series, just the best known.

But I guess, perhaps, you are looking for Samurai Goroh as he, apart from Falcon, is the other character that is in the most of the series.

I'll admit I'm not terribly familiar with F-Zero lore, but there are certainly characters who are much more villainous than Captain Falcon would even dream of (Black Shadow, Blood Falcon and Deathborn, anyone?). Also, I seem to recall that both Samus Aran and Fox McCloud are bounty hunters, yet nobody calls their heroic credentials into question. Besides, with the memetic power of the Falcon Punch, I'd say you could make a pretty strong case for Captain Falcon having displaced Samurai Goroh as the series mascot at this point (though the point is moot unless we end up getting more F-Zero games).

 

[Kolchak357]

Mr Sandman from Punch Out? I had friends that were awesome at Punch Out. I was terrible.

 

[CC13]

Mr Sandman from Punch Out? I had friends that were awesome at Punch Out. I was terrible.

That is indeed correct! I apologize for the long turnaround here, but I got really busy with holiday-related goings-on. Anyway, it's been a while since we last saw you in this thread, Kolchak; it's great to have you back! What makes Mr. Sandman such a pure distillation of what playing Punch-Out!! is all about? Read on to find out:

15. Mr. Sandman (Punch-Out!! (arcade))
Developed & Published By: Nintendo
Platform: Arcade
Year of Release: 1984

Anyone who has followed this list so far should have figured out that I have a major soft spot for the Punch-Out!! series, especially since this is the third representative of the franchise to pop up in the rankings. The goofy characters, surprisingly puzzle-like gameplay and an overall feel I've heard described as "Rocky as a Saturday morning cartoon" make for a charming and enduring franchise that stands with some of Nintendo's finest. How, then, does Mr. Sandman exemplify what makes Punch-Out!! so great?

In my entry on Super Macho Man, I touched on the idea of Super Macho Man working so well as a Punch-Out!! antagonist because of his representing the opposite of what Little Mac stands for. Every opponent has at least some of that shadow archetyping of Little Mac, but Mr. Sandman takes that concept to a whole new level. Ironically, much of the particular effectiveness of his opposition comes from a similarity to Little Mac–the two of them are certainly the characters who get played the straightest, which only makes sense for the hero of the franchise and the first &, in my opinion, best final boss of the series; however, this is the only major similarity between the two. Where Little Mac has to rely on strategy and a cool head to progress to anywhere near Mr. Sandman, Mr. Sandman can simply overwhelm an unprepared opponent with sheer brute force, as his introductory cartoon in Punch-Out!! Wii amply demonstrates with a montage of Mr. Sandman clobbering all 12 of the previous opponents with a single punch. Defeating him in each of his four Punch-Out!! series appearances is always at least a major milestone and his latest appearance has him back as the WVBA champion again after 25 years.

Where Super Macho Man works primarily as a motivational nemesis and stand-in for all the overdogs who don't take the underdog seriously, Mr. Sandman always represents a moment of the game dropping the gimmicks and getting completely serious with the player. Compare Mr. Sandman to the five opponents who precede him in the original Punch-Out!!–the cowardly Frenchman Glass Joe, the highly rhythmic Cuban boxer Piston Hurricane, the tough-but-hilariously-insane Turk Bald Bull, the uninspiring Kid Quick and the Rocky-Balboa-esque Pizza PAsta–and his nature as a harbinger of major challenges should become apparent. This "let's get dangerous" tendency on Mr. Sandman's behalf led to him becoming the WVBA champion once more in Punch-Out!! Wii (though that game also has a very challenging bonus boss). We also see this in his Title Defense introductory cartoon, where he demolishes a building with his bare hands in a fit of rage over seeing a poster of Little Mac. He has also consistently ranked high otherwise, being the Major Circuit champion in the Super NES Super Punch-Out!! and the #1 contender for the World Circuit championship in Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! If you want a reason to consider his Punch-Out!! Wii incarnation even more terrifying than he already is, consider this: Mr. Sandman and Doc Louis (your chocolate-loving trainer) have the same voice actor. This has been the source of many a fan theory trying to link the two, with one of the most common being that the two are brothers.

The rest of Mr. Sandman's characterization in Punch-Out!! Wii only adds to his intimidating persona. From his gravelly, growling baritone to his between-rounds animation, which has him stretching the ropes on his side of the ring, to the heavy metal remix of the Punch-Out!! theme during the bout to the return of Mr. Sandman's signature move, a three-uppercut combo called the Nightmare Express, everything about Mr. Sandman screams that you should run from him in the opposite direction, yet you have no choice but to face him if you want to be the WVBA World Champion. His Title Defense iteration is even more of a bear, as he gains the winking uppercuts that veterans of Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! remember so well and is basically Mike Tyson lite, which still makes him one of the most challenging opponents in the game, second only to the game's bonus boss, in my opinion.

Mr. Sandman headlined Punch-Out!! Wii's rogues' gallery for a very good reason: few enemies in the Nintendo canon represent quite as visceral an opponent as he. With his vicious moveset, sheer intimidation factor and legendary status as the WVBA's first champion, Mr. Sandman can go toe-to-toe with Nintendo's most wanted any day. Hopefully, he hasn't hung up the gloves for good and we can look forward to seeing him in the ring in yet another classic Punch-Out! game.

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: You're one thousand years too early to guess the next villain on this list!

 

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Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: You're one thousand years too early to guess the next villain on this list!

I'll admit this clue is a little vague, so here's some more help: the game I have in mind is an RPG released in 2004.

 

[CC13]

I'll admit this clue is a little vague, so here's some more help: the game I have in mind is an RPG released in 2004.

I'm really not trying to be vague with these clues, but the most obvious clue would be a little too obvious. Nevertheless, here's another clue: the game I have in mind was released for the GameCube and is part of a spinoff series.

 

[Sean DonCarlos]

The Shadow Queen?

 

[CC13]

The Shadow Queen?

And Sean DonCarlos continues to run away with this list! Why does the Shadow Queen represent such an important juncture for Nintendo at the turn of the 21st century? The answers lie below:

14. The Shadow Queen (Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door)
Developed By: Intelligent Systems
Published By: Nintendo
Platform: GameCube
Year of Release: 2004

Though only Pokemon can claim to have had a pop culture impact comparable to that of Nintendo's titanic library of platformers, the company actually has a long and storied history with the role-playing game genre beyond the world-beatingly popular Pokemon franchise. That history goes all the way back to 1989, when Nintendo, in collaboration with Creatures Inc. predecessor Ape Inc., developed & published a Japan-exclusive console-style RPG called Mother, the precursor to longstanding cult classic EarthBound, and went on from there to include the Fire Emblem series. Xenogears/Xenosaga spiritual successor Xenoblade Chronicles and even a crossover of its Pokemon franchise with Tecmo Koei's venerable grand strategy/tactical RPG series, Nobunaga's Ambition. However, many of the most fruitful RPG outings for Nintendo have starred none other than longtime flagship character Mario. Starting with Super Mario RPG in 1996, the mustachioed one has starred in a total of nine console-style RPGs, with the Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi series comprising four games each. The first of these is our topic for today, in particular the first two entries–why did Nintendo succeed so well at having Mario jump to a very different genre from his usual design haunts?

Mechanically speaking, the Paper Mario series does not go too far afield from the console-style RPG playbook. The main element that sets it apart here is one it shares in common with both its progenitor and its sister series: the timed hits system, where tapping a button at the right time during your own attack will make it more powerful, while enemy attacks can be dodged or even countered by well-timed button presses. Another element that the Paper Mario series makes use of is badges, which confer abilities on Mario, but also consume Badge Points, so you can only equip so many badges at a time, depending on what badges you want to wear and how many Badge Points you have available. Fret not, though, for Mario gains a level every 100 Star Points and can choose to gain either five HP, five Flower Points (the game's equivalent of MP) or 3 Badge Points. You also have the aid of one of several partners, including the Tattle-spamming Goomba student Goombella, the awkward (yet quite useful in the early game, thanks mainly to his 1 Defense) Koops and the utterly awesome Admiral Bobbery (which is actually at least the second time a Bob-Omb is a playable character in the Mario franchise).

The story is also not anything too heavy as console-style RPGs go, but actually does represent a noticeably less sunshine-and-rainbows turn in the context of the Mario universe. We open with Princess Peach in a seedy town called Rogueport, where she is searching for a legendary treasure said to reside behind the titular Thousand-Year Door; however, she is kidnapped by the X-Nauts (try and contain your surprise) and sends her map of the area around Rogueport off to Mario, who must use it to locate the seven Crystal Stars that open the door. Mario combats the X-Nauts throughout the game, with segments from the perspectives of Peach and Bowser punctuating each chapter. Peach befriends TEC, the X-Nauts' computer, who is immediately smitten with her and asks her to teach him about this thing she calls love, while Bowser is quite miffed that somebody other than him kidnapped Peach and seeks to remedy this personally.

Later on, we eventually find out that there is far more to the X-Nauts' designs than it initially appeared–it turns out that Sir Grodus, the leader of the X-Nauts and one of only two characters in the game to be played completely straight, knows the nature of the ancient treasure the X-Nauts seek. The treasure is actually the Shadow Queen, who ends up possessing Princess Peach. However, Sir Grodus mistakenly believed that the one to wake the Shadow Queen would command her, with this error earning him a swift destruction at the possessed Peach's hands; it turns out that Beldam had been working for the Shadow Queen the whole time and had fed Sir Grodus his fatal misinformation, as well as spread the rumor concerning treasure behind the Thousand-Year Door.

With that, the final battle of the game begins (though you can actually choose to serve the Shadow Queen instead, in a nice little homage to the original Dragon Quest; however, should you choose to do so, you will receive an automatic Game Over). The fight starts out tough enough, but after you provoke the Shadow Queen into changing into her true form and fruitlessly wail on said true form for a bit, she ends up eating the audience during the fight! Shadowy tendrils reach out into the seats and the audience simply...disappears, healing the Shadow Queen of all damage she has taken up until that point. To put the disappearance of the audience in context, bear in mind that the audience has been a constant companion to you throughout your many battles, providing not only a form of companionship, but also doing various mostly good things to affect the fight (i.e., dropping pieces of the stage on the enemy, making you invisible, throwing items to you, etc.). Hooktail, the first boss of the game actually eats the audience to regain HP in the middle of her battle, but to see the Shadow Queen consume them in such an unnatural way as she does is still a disturbing moment, especially for a game set in the Mario universe.

Thankfully, the seven Crystal Stars return to their respective lands of origin, conveniently going to the exact spots all the major characters of each chapter had congregated. The characters all pray for your victory and the combined strength of their well-wishes is enough to shake the Shadow Queen's control over Princess Peach, who then restores your HP, FP & Star Power and also grants you the ability to actually damage the Shadow Queen's true form. The Quick Change Badge is a must here, as the combination of both Bobbery's Bob-ombast and Vivian's Veil moves is the best way to win this climactic battle.

Though her boss battle is well-paced, genuinely challenging and quite exciting, that alone would not be enough to earn her a spot as the #14 Nintendo villain. To do that, she would also need to represent something about not only her game of origin itself, but the direction Nintendo would take much of the Mario franchise. As you can probably surmise from her position on this list, she accomplishes just that. As I mentioned earlier, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door represents the beginning of a relatively dark turn for the Mario franchise, at least in certain spinoff series (the Super Mario series proper remains just as predominantly bright and cheery as it ever was). Throughout the game, Mario and his allies encounter scenarios they would never see in the Super Mario games, from a fight promoter vampirically feeding on the youth and vigor of the fighters in his pit to keep himself young to the home of a primitive tribe facing the destruction of their home at the hands of a time bomb to Mario himself being possessed by one of Sir Grodus' minions; the Shadow Queen herself is the pinnacle of the less relentlessly happy take on Mario found throughout the game. This dark turn would continue into Super Paper Mario and Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon, as well as future installments of the Mario & Luigi games; Nintendo attempted to turn back the clock on this matter with the much more traditionally bright & cheery Paper Mario: Sticker Star, but this decision has come in for much criticism, so I can safely predict that we haven't seen the last of the dark side of everyone's favorite Brooklynite plumber.

Though Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door does have several postgame bosses, all of whom are quite daunting, none of them can lay claim to the Shadow Queen's well-rounded portfolio. The level of Vile Villain, Saccharine Show she brings to the table rivals most Kirby antagonists, her plan was one of the most well thought-out of any Nintendo villain, her lieutenant effortlessly manipulated the apparent big bad of the game and she only lost in the end because of blatant Only The Author Can Save Them Now shenanigans. The only thing holding her back is that her demise at the end of the game seemed rather final. However, if she were to have somehow survived for a rematch, you can bet that she will find herself undiminished from her accomplishments of nearly 10 years ago.

Next Time on The Top 25 Nintendo Villains: The left hand doesn't need to know what the right hand is doing...